:
Beauty and wellness remain for both women and men an important target also because global attractiveness is considered a cue indicating the ability to maintain beauty and wellness. Consequently neuromarketing has occurred as an innovative mean to interact with consumer's trend, actually looking for high-quality and natural cosmetics and food. By the biometric studies, in fact, it seems possible to verify the consumers’ willingness to buy the right products they are looking for. On the other hand, customers are requesting cosmeceuticals and nutraceuticals acting positively on the superficial appearance of face and body, seem to be able to boost the immune system also, limiting the stress conditions. This general disease is induced by the actual way of living on a planet invaded by a great quantity of waste released from human’s activities. The consequent pollution alters the ecological balance of the body, influencing negatively the life of animals and plants also. Thus, the induced stress, further increased by the COVID-19 spread, could change the human brain' neural conditions. Consequently, in humans the production of both neurons' stem cells and cortisol could decrease, while in plants, the patterns of growth could affect the leaf cuticle and stomatal conductance. Thus brain, under psychosocial stress, actively demands energy from the body, eliciting a marked increase in eating by a major carbohydrate intake which sacrifices the requirements of other organs.
In any way, pollution has wide-ranging adverse health and social effects, further worsened by an increased worldwide aged population who, requiring more food and goods, increases the waste production.
What the proposed solution?
To change the way of consuming and producing, it is necessary to optimize the material resource, minimizing waste that should be recycled and reused by a green economy approach. So doing, it could be possible to realize a new industrial Renaissance reducing consumption of water, energy and natural raw materials. Thus the necessity to use sustainable technologies and materials for maintaining human wellbeing in an environment in which the species' biodiversity could be assured.
At this purpose, chitin nanofibrils(CN), nano-lignin (NL) and their derived compounds have been proposed to make nanoparticles (NPs) by the use of water as solvent. These NPs, loaded with different active ingredients, may be embedded into innovative natural or man-made polymers and used to make biodegradable carriers in the form of non-woven tissues and films. Depending on the polymers and on the actives loaded into the fibers, these new vehicles may be used to produce smart cosmeceuticals, nutraceuticals or advanced medications. It is
interesting to underline that all these innovative NPs and tissue/films can be produced by natural polymers and ingredients, obtained from waste materials and produced by sustainable technologies at low consumption of water and energy, according to the new green economy.
Rootlets, a Malting By-Product with Great Potential